Wednesday, January 27, 2016

- Corporate
welfare and entitlements for the top 1 % - .

A few of the giveaways to the rich - and how much they cost the US :

1. Tax Breaks for CEO bonuses
($7 billion/year)

The biggest corporations exploit
a 20-year-old loophole that allows them to write off
inflated compensation packages for
CEOs,
billing stock options,
performance-based bonuses
to taxpayers.
-
In 2010,
the biggest corporations cost Americans $7 billion by writing off inflated executive
pay. - That $7 billion could fund the annual budget for the National
Science Foundation —
- 11,000 scientific research
projects each year
- 26 Nobel laureates in the last 5
years.

Between 2007 and 2010, this
loophole accounted for more than $30
billion in corporate welfare.

2. Tax cuts for luxury
corporate jets ($300 million/year)

Currently, corporations get huge
tax deductions by writing off purchases of
corporate jets, fancy cars-limousines , …
and chauffeurs …
These tax breaks for some of the wealthiest Americans cost the rest of us $300 million each year.

3. Big oil subsidies ( $37.5
billion/year )

Between $10 billion and $52
billion per year on corporate welfare for the fossil fuel industry .
OCI estimated that total subsidies to big oil – approximately - $37.5
billion in 2014,

4. Pharmaceutical subsidies
($270 billion/year)

The pharmaceutical industry gets
roughly $270 billion a year
This is over $1,900.- per household in corporate welfare.
This is mainly due to the bill that George W. Bush signed into law in 2003,
which prevents Medicare from negotiating drug prices with pharmaceutical
companies.
-
The biggest drug companies also make (a combined $711 billion in profits between 2003
and 2012)
by buying patents for drugs - largely developed with taxpayer-funded research,
then jacking up the price …

5. Capital gains tax breaks
($51 billion/year)

Capital gains, are taxed at a 20 % -
real, actual work 35 %. 53 percent of Americans own no stock at all,
The richest 5 percent own two-thirds of the stock.
Only 10 percent of Americans have pensions,
The total amount of lost revenue was $256 billion between fiscal years 2012 and
2016,
or $51 billion a year over the last
5 years.
If investment income was taxed at the same rate as wages,75 percent of that revenue would come from the
richest 0.3 % of Americans; 92 % of that revenue from those
making $200,000 or more per year.
The chart below shows what percentage of income each tax bracket makes from
capital gains -

Chart courtesy of The Century
Foundation.

6. Corporate tax subsidies from state and local governments ($80.4
billion/year)

In 2012, - tax
breaks in 1,874 programs cost
taxpayers $80.4 billion every year for corporate welfare
in their state.

7. Big Ag ($18 billion/year)

Median income of commercial farm
households was $84,649 in 2011 —
70 % more than the average American household.
Farmers grow crops on land that is unproductive,
then - make money from insurance claims ...
In 2011, 26 farmers each got an
annual subsidy of $1 million, or
more .

8. Wall Street ($83
billion/year)

As big banks grow bigger,
the Federal Reserve lets them borrow at lower interest rates than other banks —
essentially subsidizing the continued growth of the big banks.
The 10 biggest banks get $83 billion per year in corporate welfare.